Artisans

MILAN HAJEK
Czech inventor

Milan Hajek has a way with waste. Back in 1997 he devised a means to use microwaves to melt glass around industrial waste laden with toxic heavy metals. The melted glass encapsulated the waste, thus making it safe for disposal.

Though his scheme was eventually shelved as too costly, it got Hajek — who today is head of the Center of Microwave Technology in Prague — thinking about using microwaves to melt glass for his country’s renowned band of crystal producers. The system he devised, and which he refers to as the Microwave Art Glass Furnace, can now save glassmakers up to 50% in energy costs and spares the environment the nasty emissions produced by gas-fired furnaces.

“Glass is like ice,” Hajek says. “If you put an ice cube in the microwave, it won’t melt. The microwaves go right through it. But if there’s as much as a drop of water on the ice, the drop will heat up and melt the whole cube.” After two years of painstaking research and experimentation, Hajek identified a metallic compound — he won’t say what it is — that functions like the drop of water on the ice cube. Hajek’s compound kick-starts the melting process and can then be removed without a trace. “You need to know something about microwaves, something about glass and combine the two,” Hajek says. “The solution was so simple that it made me wonder why no one had come up with it before me.”

Hajek has already produced a small furnace for up to 10 kg of glass. Four of the furnaces are currently in operation: two in the Czech Republic, one in France and one in the United States. Hajek says a 30-50-kg model will be available for sale in September. With patents granted or pending in some 60 countries, thousands of years after man first learned how to combine soda from ashes, lime from seashells and silica from beach sand to form glass, Hajek is ready to set the world of crystal manufacture on fire with his microwave furnace.

—JAN STOJASPAL

DANA HRADECKA
Czech co-founder of Botanicus

There would be no life without plants. From the very beginning, mankind has used plants for food, construction material, medicine, decoration and to make clothes, dyes, paper. We respect the potential of the plant kingdom and we recognize the contribution it can bring to those of us living in modern industrial societies. While keeping quality control methods on a par with modern science, we have nevertheless taken as our measuring stick some of the values and philosophies of the Middle Ages, a time of deep love and respect for the wonders of nature and for the virtues of hand craftsmanship. Wherever possible, we grow our plants ourselves. We emphasize simplicity. We go back to the basics. Our attitude to things changes when we see how something is made and how much time and effort go into it.

Many of the recipes and technologies we use are centuries old. To make washballs [a piece of soap shaped into a ball] we have adapted Italian and French recipes from the 15th and 16th centuries. Before they used bones and tallow to make soap. We use coconut, palm or olive oil, but otherwise we use cornstarch as a bonding agent, resin of the Styrax tree as a preservative and lavender, orange or rose and various essential oils for aroma. The soap is pressed by hand in molds made from beechwood.

Globalization and joining the European Union carry a number of advantages, but these developments are often unkind to small producers, bringing costly new norms and regulations. This is one of the reasons traditional producers are disappearing. Small makers of traditional foodstuffs like French cheese are disappearing because they have to use stainless steel equipment. It pains me to see Coca-Cola or Algida ice-cream stands in mountain villages of Crete or Greece. You ask for their traditional tea and they don’t have it because they only carry Lipton. A large company is no longer flexible to accommodate market needs and tailor its production according to what ingredients the season has to offer.

JAMIE OWENS
British taxi driver

A driver was only slightly exaggerating when he said “Your gorgeous daughter could be coming home from a party drunk and naked, and would get home safely in a black cab.” Taxi riders anywhere else in the world know that these London trademarks offer such consistent excellence that you curse them only when you can’t find one on a rainy night.

Like the 21,000 other men (and approximately 220 women) who hold the green badge of a London cabbie, Jamie Owens had to slave for it: 21 months on a moped acquiring “The Knowledge” — a detailed mental map of the 25,000 streets within 10 km of Charing Cross, plus major routes farther out. For the last 10 years he has been his own boss. “The beauty of the job is that if you want to take a day off, you don’t have to ask anybody, except maybe your bank manager. If you have a lot of bills you’ve got unlimited overtime.” He has never been robbed. He says he has “become a good instant judge of character” and has learned to “let a drunk walk up to the cab while watching in the mirror” to see if he’s beyond the pale. Sometimes Owens makes $60 an hour, sometimes $6.

His traditional cab, a 1997 Fairway model (only two manufacturers remain), with chrome bumpers and a walnut dashboard, prompts couples to hire him for weddings. But he also totes an electronic organizer to download e-mail via his mobile phone, by which he monitors bookings arriving on his website www.london-taxi.co.uk. He started it as a hobby but it now gets 200,000 hits a month. A hot topic on its drivers’ forum is the city’s plan to regulate the 40,000 unlicensed cabs that siphon off an estimated 70 million fares annually.

Would Owens advise his own 10-year-old daughter to follow in his footsteps? “I’d prefer her to do something else — but sure. It’s a good life.”

—J.F.O. McALLISTER

HEINER KAMPS
German master baker

I originally didn’t become a baker of my own volition. My father owned a small bakery in the country and, since I was the eldest son, I was expected to follow in his footsteps. I set up on my own in 1982 after I had studied applied economics at night school. While I learned my trade in my father’s bakeshop, I heard about the ‘succession problem’ in many small craftsmen’s establishments in Germany: many of today’s young people don’t want to take over their parents’ business. I was sure that here was my chance to build a large regional business. The standard artisan training [in Germany] is insufficient if you want to set up your own business these days. It’s no longer enough just to be a good baker, you also have to be a good organizer. The reason is that the size of enterprises has increased in recent years, markets have changed, customers’ demands have increased. The regulatory framework of our vocational training for the handicrafts, however, still dates back to the 1950s. The training regulations should be reformed radically because we need people with higher qualifications for self-employed businesses, particularly in the bakery trade. Despite all this, the old adage still holds: a trade in hand finds gold in every land. If, for all that, the number of apprentices is on the decrease, the reason is that there are too few high-school leavers who are interested in the bakery and related trades. That’s wrong because there are a quite a few businesses today that offer prospects for personal growth in the production sector as well as the management sector for people who have passed their vocational traineeship.

It’s a cliché that the large businesses devour the small ones. It’s a normal process that small businesses have to be closed down once the older generation retires and there is no successor around. Consumers need not be concerned by this development. On the contrary. The quality of breads and pastries has improved and there is a much greater variety on offer today because there is competition between the bakeries. A revolution has taken place during the last 20 years, and that has caused the baking trade in Germany to rank high among the other crafts.

OLAVI LINDÉN
Finnish toolmaker

For more than 350 years, Fiskars has forged, hammered, bent and welded iron into refined tools sold all over the world. In the United States alone, the firm’s largest market, millions of Americans bought a pair of Fiskars scissors last year. The company also produces a line of garden tools including pruners, loppers and shears. Whatever their intended use, Fiskars utensils are designed for functionality. “A spade should look like a spade,” says chief designer Olavi Lindén. “An exaggerated avant-garde look makes a product so strange that nobody wants it. A successful product should be simple and honest.” That design philosophy has won the company numerous awards over the years.

Fiskars was founded in the town of the same name in 1649 as an iron works and hammer mill producing nails, wire, knives, hoes and reinforced wheels. In the 1830s, the company established Finland’s first fine forging workshop. The fine forgers, each of whom trained for eight years, guarded their professional secrets carefully. Any unfinished work was securely locked up at the end of the day’s labors. Today, Fiskars craftsmen use computer simulations to measure the impact of various designs on the muscles of the hand and arm.

As Finland’s oldest industrial company and one of the oldest companies in the world, Fiskars has managed to show that sticking with what you are good at — and refining the craft in step with new technology — is the best way to stay in business. Although materials, shapes and production methods may change, Fiskars has shown that carefully designed tools will always be in fashion — and in demand.

—ULLA PLON

IGOR PANTELIC
Croat-Dutch maker of musical-instrument cases

I started making cello cases by accident. I had a friend who played the cello. At that time I was repairing speedboats, so I’d been working with glass fibers, resins and plastics and knew a bit about the technique of making molds. This friend of mine got the idea to make cello cases that would really fit the needs of the cellist: super-lightweight, strong and custom-fitted to the shape of the instrument. We started developing a case for him. When his friends and colleagues saw his case, they wanted one for themselves. It spread by word of mouth.

I have customers from all over the world — including big names like Yo-Yo Ma, Anner Bylsma and Nathaniel Rosen. You can buy normal factory-made cases, but they are mass-produced so they try to make one case that fits all instruments. It’s never really good enough or light enough, and the instrument is not really well-protected. The inner fittings of my cases are all custom-made for a particular instrument, and people can choose any color or pattern they’d like, such as a leopard print or chessboard. Everything is hand-made. On the other hand, you’re using materials that are more high-tech. It’s just plastic and stinking chemicals. But the technique you’re working with is traditional. The only tool you need is a good mold — and really good hands. I also have no one in between me and the customer. In a way, it’s like coming to the tailor: your cello is getting its own suit exactly how you wish it to be. I don’t consider myself an artist. An artist is someone who’s busy with himself and what he wants to express.

The whole purpose of my case is to protect the instrument. You can give it a nice look, and it looks kind of like an art object. But actually, it’s all very functional. I am part inventor, part craftsman, with an aesthetic sense. The fun is in inventing something. It’s good for your soul.

PIA WALLEN
Swedish designer

I was brought up in a family that was interested in design — Marimekko, Alvar Aalto — so this was natural for me. At design school, the teachers had us look at our folk-art traditions. Felting is one of the world’s oldest textile techniques, and that’s how I discovered knitted and felted wool. My connection with the folk-art tradition was very strong when I was just out of design school. You can see the connection in my products. But my work is also modern and made with today’s production methods. Mass production isn’t a bad thing. Most designers couldn’t survive without mass production. I think it would be sad if people wanted certain products but could not have them. My slippers are an example. One person gave the slippers to her mother, who was in the hospital. Staff and other patients asked for them, which made me think about finding different ways to reach people with certain products. With items like my cross blankets, that would be impossible. The blankets cannot be mass produced at the moment. They are made by a small family company with very old machines. They can only do five a day.

Scandinavian design has a strong connection between function and shape. When I designed my silver bracelet, I wanted it to be lined in felt because I couldn’t wear my silver in the cold of winter. Some people said, ‘Oh, it gets dirty!’ But it’s felted wool and you can wash it by hand. I want to create perfect products, both in design and function. Sometimes you have to wait for solutions. This year, I took over production of the slippers. There had been some production problems, and I wanted to develop the sole. So I put rubber dots on it. I first made the slippers in 1992. Now I think it’s the end. I can’t develop them any more. I know my working methods may be unusual. I want the product to appeal to the customer’s heart. And I want to be the ultimate in all these areas: in quality, in practicality, in design.

RAYMOND BERTHILLON
French ice cream maker

Berthillon’s exclusive delicacies lure thousands of sweet-toothed clients to his Ile St. Louis shop each year. Founded in 1954 by Raymond Berthillon and his wife, the shop became a favored spot for well-heeled Parisians before travel books began letting tourists in on the chic secret in the 1970s.

Berthillon’s ice cream is known for its flavorful creativity. The shop offers nearly 80 varieties including Café au Whiskey, Fresh Fig, Guava, Ginger-Caramel, Kumquat, Thyme-Lemon, and even one flavored with Earl Grey tea. To a public concerned about the failing quality of their food, however, Berthillon’s trademark dedication to detail is even more appreciated.

Berthillon still personally selects the grapes for his grape-rum ice cream. He also ensures that none of the chocolate ingredients has been scorched during preparation and, to limit nitrate levels, he uses only mineral water. Dairy products in Berthillon ice cream were supplied by the same Norman farmer for decades, and when the best fruit on offer in Paris is deemed not good enough, Berthillon will have mandarin oranges flown in from Sicily and fresh wild strawberries from Málaga.

That attention to quality has not faltered as his children and grandchildren join Berthillon in running the business, though their dedication to tradition does have some drawbacks. Despite its continued popularity, Berthillon still closes for most of France’s July-through-August vacation season.

—BRUCE CRUMLEY

GEORG RIEDEL
Austrian crystal glassmaker

It’s easy enough to recognize a classic Riedel wineglass: pure and elegant lines, soap-bubble delicacy, flawless clarity, perfect balance in the hand. What’s not so easy, for the uninitiated, is to identify the dozens of shapes and sizes that have made Riedel glasses the uncontested favorite of winemakers and wine lovers around the world. Riedel’s Sommelier collection, for instance, includes 33 different lead-crystal glasses, each one designed for a specific type of wine or grape variety.

The Riedel family glassmaking tradition dates back 10 generations, to 17th century Bohemia. The present-day design concept is basic Bauhaus: form follows function, in this case a form that brings out the best in its contents and can even help disguise a fault or two. The volume and shape of the bowl, the thickness of the crystal and the rim’s outward flare or inward curve and finish all help determine which of a wine’s several layers of aromas develops first or most fully. It was Claus Riedel, designer and ninth-generation owner of the family firm, who first noted that the size and shape of a glass affect the perception of aroma and flavor. In 1973 he designed the basic Sommelier series that set the wine world in a whirl. Claus’ son Georg took over the company in 1994 and put scientific and marketing punch behind his father’s pioneering concepts.

Riedel’s flagship crystal is still produced in the time-honored way, with glowing lumps of molten glass mouth-blown into cast-iron molds and fitted with hand-fashioned stems and bases by master craftsmen working in two factories at Kufstein, in the Austrian Tyrol near the German border, and at Schneegattern, north of Salzburg. Riedel glasses are near-perfect examples of ongoing innovation in traditional craftsmanship.

—JUDY FAYARD

CHRISTIAN THOLONIAT
French patissier

Standing in a tiny shop in Paris’ 10th arrondissement, one of the city’s seedier neighborhoods, Christian Tholoniat is describing the naked woman he made in his laboratory. Tholoniat is a patissier, and “laboratory” is what patissiers call the place where they work. Tholoniat’s lab is out back, across a cobbled courtyard. The naked woman was life-size and made of chocolate. She reclined on a bed of 600 sugared roses as the centerpiece for a party thrown by the Baroness de Rothschild. Tholoniat’s father, who made the roses, agreed on a price with the Baroness over drinks at the café on the corner. “My father was an artist,” says Tholoniat, “a man who was passionate about his work. He never let a day go by without sculpting a bit of sugar.”

Tholoniat was born in St. Etienne, where his father was hiding out after escaping from a German prisoner-of-war camp. His grandfather was a charcutier, his wife Marise is a patissier’s daughter and both their children are in the food business. “It’s a family tradition,” he says with a smile. He’s a smallish man with close-cropped white hair, twinkling eyes and a thick Parisian accent. Things have changed since he first came to work in his father’s shop in the mid-1960s. “Back then we used to coat our chocolates one by one with a fork,” he remembers. “We used to spend whole nights doing it in the Christmas season.” Tholoniat’s personal contribution to food artistry was made possible by the deep freeze. Once a week, he shuts himself away in his lab to knock out a batch of the dessert that has made him famous among Parisian gourmets. His semifreddo is a delicately chilled concoction of whipped cream and nougat sandwiched between layers of light sponge cake, its surface caramelized Spanish-style with a red-hot iron. Tholoniat can supply this delicacy for an intimate dinner for two people or a 25-person banquet. If you ask nicely, he might even come up with a naked woman.

—NICHOLAS LE QUESNE

WILLI ULRICH
German sword grinder

For a man who considers himself “absolutely devoid of a violent streak,” Willi Ulrich has a strange profession. The last remaining member of the once famous — and numerous — guild of sword grinders in Solingen in North Rhine-Westphalia, where bladed weapons have been produced since the 14th century, the energetic 59-year-old spends his workday at the grindstone, fashioning custom-made foils, sabers, even powerful broadswords. “It’s a wonderful job,” says Ulrich, whose family has brought forth sword grinders for more than 200 years.

“Every piece, particularly the replicas of ancient weapons, is different and needs to be honed to perfection.” (For a look at Ulrich’s work, go to www.blankwaffen-ulrich.de) Although Ulrich can’t complain about a lack of orders yet — he mainly produces ceremonial épées, slim dueling swords with gilded lion’s-head hilts, for marksmen’s associations and hunters — the artisan knows that his craft is destined to die out and that swords too will be mechanically manufactured in the future. “It just doesn’t make sense to train young people as sword grinders when their livelihood can’t be guaranteed,” he says.

His son refused to follow in his father’s footsteps for that reason. “It’s very sad,” says Ulrich. But until his retirement in two years he will keep on the lookout for new models to grind: “I could never just sit back,” Ulrich says. Anyone who suggests otherwise should be ready to cross swords.

—URSULA SAUTTER

ANDRZEJ CICHON
Polish wood carver

I started carving for pleasure when I was 12. I was making small figurines from broken poplar branches with a pocket-knife. Later, when my father was building our house, I used concrete bricks as carving material. Then I took part in some local competitions and started to carve in a more advanced way. So gradually I became a professional woodcarver.

First of all, one has to prepare the wood for carving. I use lime wood I buy from state forests, and it lies in piles for one-and-a-half to two years.

I cut the logs in half so they don’t crack. Then I peel them to prevent bark beetles and other pests from damaging the wood. The following stage is an idea, a conception. Either I have some idea or a customer tells me what he wishes to order. I have several hundred pictures of my work, but a client often asks me to introduce his particular ideas. For example, recently one ordered a composition of a family house but instead of the two children shown on the picture he wanted to have six children, a dog and a cat. I don’t draw projects on paper. Everything comes into being in my head. When I have a fixed conception in my head, I pick up the proper piece of wood and start to rough it down. The initial shaping is done with a hatchet, some technical cuts I make with a saw. Then I take chisel and hammer and I make a form of the sculpture. With cutters and penknives I’ve mostly made myself, I give the sculpture its final shape. I also use some sand-paper to smooth it. Then the sculpture goes into the hands of my wife Grazyna for painting. A sculpture originates from an inspiration. During the German occupation, my grandfather’s yard bordered on the ghetto. He told me how Jews were passing from the ghetto through his woodshed, seeking food and sometimes to escape. I have made a composition showing my vision of that, and this sculpture is now in a museum in Plock.